On August 15, more than 40 youth leaders and volunteers gathered at Montrose Zion United Methodist Church for a Youth Leader Training Day focused on a simple but important question: What might happen if we approached youth ministry with greater intentionality, curiosity, creativity, and connection?

Representing more than 30 churches from across East and West Ohio, the group included leaders who have been in ministry for less than a month alongside veterans with more than 30 years of experience. Despite their different contexts and levels of experience, participants shared a common desire to help young people develop a faith that lasts.

The day began by inviting leaders to stretch their creative discipleship muscles. Through play, curiosity, imagination, and conversation, participants were reminded that creativity is more than simply making something. It is a way of seeing, wondering, and noticing where God is already moving.

Youth Leader Network Regional Coordinator Stefanie Williams reflected on the value of free and creative play in youth ministry spaces, quoting Jonathan Haidt’s The Anxious Generation: “in unsupervised, child-led play where children best learn to tolerate bruises, handle their emotions, read other children’s emotions, take turns, resolve conflicts, and play fair,” she said.

The conversation challenged leaders to consider what young people may learn when ministry spaces allow room for experimentation, failure, curiosity and discovery.

I want to emphasize the goal was not simply to make youth ministry more engaging. This was not a creativity workshop. We were not trying to make youth ministry more interesting. We were trying to become more attentive to God and creativity can help us do that.

That idea was reinforced through the story of artist Franz Marc and Mary Oliver’s poem Franz Marc’s Blue Horses, which invites readers to consider the possibility that “the desire to make something beautiful is the piece of God that is inside each of us.”

From creativity, the day moved toward another essential discipleship practice of learning to notice Kairos moments, those ordinary moments when God seems to be inviting us to pay attention, ask a question, tell a story or take a next faithful step. Rather than simply delivering content to young people, leaders were encouraged to recognize the spiritual possibilities already present in the lives and experiences of their students.

The day also introduced the newly formed Conference Youth Collective (CYC), a localized discipleship leadership pathway for teenagers. Jennifer Dyer of Montrose Zion UMC, who is the CYC coordinator for the Ohio Episcopal Area consisting of both East and West Ohio, talked about the value of shared learning, modeling practical discipleship tools for students and creating localized pathways where young people can grow as disciples and leaders.

“The Conference Youth Collective is a localized leadership pathway for teenagers, creating opportunities for young people to develop practical discipleship habits and real-life leadership skills within the safety of Christ-centered community. It also creates a connectional pathway where churches can learn alongside one another, equip young people together and strengthen the work already happening in local communities,” Dyer shared.

Designed to be an opt-in, not an add-on, the CYC will allow students to remain rooted in their local churches while participating in a shared six-session discipleship pathway with other young people. The initiative seeks to strengthen what is already happening in local churches while creating new opportunities for connection, collaboration, servant leadership and shared learning.

Perhaps the most important lesson of the day was that youth ministry was never meant to be a solo sport. Regional Coordinator Anne Horvath reminded her fellow leaders that connection creates space for encouragement, shared wisdom, collaboration and the simple reassurance that “we are not doing this work alone.”

The Youth Leader Training Day was ultimately less about adding another program to an already crowded youth group calendar and more about stretching the muscles of discipleship in real time, and learning to notice, create and invite young people into deeper participation in the life of faith.

Sometimes the most important question isn't, “What should we do next?” It is simply, “What is God already doing – and are we paying attention?”

If you are interested in your church and youth group being founding members of the Conference Youth Collective initiative, please complete this online interest form.

Article written by Tim Beck, associate director of Engagement with Youth in the Connectional Ministries Office and the Ministry & Resource coordinator in the Office of Discipleship Ministries for the Ohio Episcopal Area of The United Methodist Church.